


Someday

by heartsblade



Category: Fire Emblem Heroes, Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Established Relationship, Exalt Chrom, Fluff, Implied Proposal, M/M, Romance, these two are in love and sappy and thats all that matters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-18
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-30 17:46:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17833217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartsblade/pseuds/heartsblade
Summary: Ike knows Chrom to be every inch the king he is sworn to be. He could only hope that someday, one day, he’ll match him, and they’ll be kings together, Ike’s reservations be damned. He would shift the very earth they sat upon if it were Chrom’s wish for it to be so; someway, somehow, he’d find a way to make it happen.





	Someday

**Author's Note:**

> i think this is my shortest work but like. anyway i love these two i'm out here feeding myself

Ike isn’t a poet.

When he looked to the orange sky and the retreating sun, he saw just that: the anticlimactic end of another long day. When he looked to the stars and the moon they surrounded, he merely saw another opportunity to watch the sun rise and set yet another day to fight another battle.

The changing of seasons fell onto him as something else to strategize around; however important the downfall of his enemies may be to him, his friends and allies rose above it. He failed to recognize the beauty of his surroundings, even if they were white with snow, just as he failed to recognize the beauty of all things coming to an end in the fall to rise anew in spring. The leaves crunching under his feet were an annoyance, the snow in his hair and boots made him cold, spring showers made him irritable and wet and the heat of summer drove him wild with an insatiable need to train and prepare for the battles to come.

No, Ike isn’t a poet. He saw things for what they were and nothing more. 

He didn’t know how to translate his thoughts into words or give a deeper, definitive meaning to all the things he wanted to convey; and lastly, he didn’t read poetry, or have enough understanding of it, to interpret it outside of the glass walls that surround it. No, he doesn’t know a single damn thing about putting words to what he feels to make it something fantastical and beautiful.

The way he looks at Chrom, though? He did so unknowingly with hardly any effort at all.

When he looked at Chrom, he saw more than a man in command of an army that looked to him as a leader, a king, a comrade. He saw a man with the whole of the halidom embroidered across his shoulders that he swore to protect and uphold against whatever adversary dared to stand in his way of fulfilling his duties. Many have sang to have seen the clear blue sky in his eyes, that the sun itself followed him wherever he went, that his radiance as a king transcended the realm and had been acknowledged by ancients and gods in Naga’s name. 

And yet, when Ike looked into those very eyes, and held the very body sworn to have been blessed by the ancients themselves, he didn’t see the sky in those eyes or feel the warmth Chrom is said to embody. He saw, in those eyes, a man who thought fall to be an annoyance, spring to be a hindrance, and complained about the snow in his hair and his boots because it made him cold. When he held him, he felt the tense and taut body of a man long overdue for a good night’s rest, a man who clung to him at night to leech his warmth. Ike saw him to be every inch the human he knew and fell in love with, and wondered how many knew him to be the very tempest he is said to quell with his words alone.

“You seem rather deep in thought.”

Chrom’s voice pulls him from the orange sky he looked to with narrowed eyes. He turns to him with a thoughtful look; the exalted king lifts Ike’s hand to play with his fingers. “Is something on your mind?” He inquires, adorning each of Ike’s calloused fingers with a kiss. He locks their hands together in front of his chest as he leans into his shoulder. “It might help to talk about it.”

Even if Ike were a poet, he would be a terrible one.

He navigated his words like a ship damned for a wreck. He enunciated his feelings no better than a single line drawn on a sheet of paper, if the table it were drawn on had been shaken by an earthquake. He recalls a time when many looked to him as a lord, and how uncomfortable the title felt attributed to his name. The speeches he gave would surely be seen as unacceptable now if the people of Tellius were not so desperate to cling to the words of someone they hailed a hero to see them through the day. Looking back, he never quite saw himself fit for the role. He blames his humble upbringing for that, and he found more comfort to be derived from something he knew all his life over the luxuries he knew his fellow comrades to be deprived of, no matter how equal he wished to make things.

He knows a lord and a poet did not go hand in hand, though he knew someone of so high a standing would he held accountable for what they said, and no lord of this realm would be respected if he were not so eloquent with his words. Ike lacked that eloquence, be it in lordship, or poetry itself. He didn’t have a way with words to make the skies changing colours more magical than they really are, or empower a nation being as straightforward and direct as he is known to be.

It raises the question:

“Someday…”

“Yes?”

“Do you think I would make a great ruler?”

He turns to Chrom, who lowers their joined hands to fix him with a look of perplexity. “How do you mean?”

“I was a lord, once.”

“So you’ve said,” Chrom says, his head tilting ever so slightly with his confusion. “You haven’t spoke much of it.”

“It was brief, yes. I wasn’t comfortable with all that it entailed. To be a leader is one thing; to lead a nation, to be given what so many lost, or could only dream of… it didn’t sit well with me. I relinquished my title and returned to being a mercenary.”

“So the legends have said.”

“It makes me wonder, if I were to ever return to that… do you think I have what it takes?”

He keeps his eyes trained on Chrom, who seemed to be mulling his question over with deep consideration. He looks between Ike and the darkening sky, and for a moment, he thought the exalt had been drawing comparisons, until he broke the silence with a thoughtful hum. “I should think so, yes,” he finally says, his gaze fixated on him. “You and I are alike in many ways, you know. We share common beliefs and ideals. It may not be much, but… people seem to think I have what it takes to be their ruler. If we’re alike in that way, I don’t think you’ll have much trouble at all in that regard. Why do you ask?”

How could Ike say this without being too forward?

He thinks of an answer all the while he admires his ruler beneath the golden light the sun cast in its descent. The sky faded from orange, to red, and now the stars were slowly coming into view. All this time had passed, and Ike had yet to respond. He simply sat and stared, his breath taken by the sight he beheld. He thought if he had a pen and parchment now, he could find the words he wanted to say that would wax lyrical of his beloved that he wouldn’t be able to say aloud.

Orange skies be damned.

He wonders if this is what they saw when they thought of their king in his radiance, if this is the image that entered their minds when they sang and wrote their praises in his tribute?

“You’ve been quiet for some time now,” Chrom murmurs, raising his hand to stroke one side of his face with the back of it. “Are you alright?”

“Just thinking.”

“You seem to be doing that a lot lately.” It’s not said maliciously, let alone mockingly; it’s said as an observation, and at closer inspection, a little worriedly. He returns to stroking the back of Ike’s hand with his fingertips; simple featherlight touches that traced small faded scars there. 

Ike knows Chrom to be every inch the king he is sworn to be. He could only hope that someday, one day, he’ll match him, and they’ll be kings together, Ike’s reservations be damned. He would shift the very earth they sat upon if it were Chrom’s wish for it to be so; someway, somehow, he’d find a way to make it happen.

“Were you to be at my side,” Chrom begins, and Ike notices the blush dappling the apples of his cheeks, the way his eyes shift watery when he meets his gaze. “I could think no other befitting to share the throne with.”

“No matter which way I slice it… I’m in this for the long run, huh?”

“Were you so foolish to think it would not only be a matter of time before you ascended the throne beside me?”

“I was foolish to think you would misplace your trust in someone to rule alongside you.”

“You will be a fine king.” Chrom wraps an arm around him to pull him close to lock lips, his free hand sliding from Ike’s knuckles to his bicep, eventually coming to join the other in their place. “You need only to leave the talking to me.”

“Is this your way of proposing?”

“I suppose that part is only natural,” he laughs, and presses another kiss to his lips. “All in due time, though. I want for you to be comfortable and ready to step into that role.”

“Who says I can’t be a Shepherd and a king?”

“The same man who’s only beginning to believe in his own greatness,” Chrom whispers, hands coming to frame his beloved’s face, his thumbs settling on the space under Ike’s eyes. “The same man destined to make me the happiest in all the world, I should think.”

Ike supposes there are other things he can do to make up for what he lacks in the literary department. Perhaps he'll fare better as a king rather than a lord, so long as he leaves the words alone for his equal to take up.


End file.
